Since hearing earlier this month that HTC's Desire S, Thunderbolt, and other select handsets would receive ICS updates "by the end of August," we have heard nary a peep from the Taiwanese manufacturer. Today though, thanks to an alleged leaked RUU, we have a stock Ice Cream Sandwich 4.0.3 build for the Thunderbolt (aka Mecha).

According to Administrator's post at TeamBAMF's forums, the ROM, based on a leaked RUU (and carrying build number 7.00.605.2), is said to be fully functional and fully stock, but it's worth noting that the ROM is deodexed and rooted, meaning those wishing to retain root are in luck, but if you – for one reason or another – want a strictly stock, non-rooted experience, you'll have to wait.

Check out a few screenshots of Mecha's 4.0.3 build in action:

We haven't tracked down the full RUU for download just yet, but those interested in (finally) getting some (sense-flavored) ICS goodness on their Thunderbolt can grab the ROM at the link below.

UPDATE: It looks like TeamBAMF's forum/download links are down for the moment, we'll keep this post updated pending alternate links.

This article deals with a couple of advanced topics. If you’re unfamiliar with some of the terms, hit up our primers here:

Should have kept my mouth shut until I got my copy downloaded.. 280 megs into it and the download hung :( At least we have something to look forward to again with our dated Thunderbolts..

Paul

Mine never finished either :( I was download number 3 and 4 and neither of mine were successful and they failed shortly before finishing as well. Here's to hoping we find a mirror soon! I just happened to be looking at his twitter when he posted about it being available

itznfb

Finally. The re-birth of the Thunderbolt. Long live TBolt.

Tyler Chappell

I am running it right now and it is a bit slow/laggy. Doesn't seem to be any super major issues yet, probably functional as a daily driver. I reset/formatted cache, wiped dalvik, and formatted system. Wifi seems pretty finicky though (you try it to turn it on and it just wants to sit there saying its turning on, and when it did turn on and I tried to connect to my wifi it just shut itself off), and I had to do a reboot to get from 1X back into 4G because it seemed like it was taking forever to switch back over.